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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25150927">Try (for you, for me, for us)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonlight_Blue_Rose/pseuds/Moonlight_Blue_Rose'>Moonlight_Blue_Rose</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>One Piece</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Eating Disorders, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Purging, i'm sorry Nami, sanji is a good friend</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 03:27:41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,015</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25150927</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonlight_Blue_Rose/pseuds/Moonlight_Blue_Rose</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>She is a good actress, she thinks, and smiles at Nojiko over the table with warm food.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Nami &amp; Vinsmoke Sanji</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>31</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Try (for you, for me, for us)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was a spur-of-the-moment decision so I am sorry if it's not really accurate. I don't have experience with eating disorders, so feel free to point out the things you don't think are accurate.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Nami knows her family is poor. She knows they barely scrap enough money to live by. She knows that Bellemere-san eats less and less every day to keep her and Nojiko fed. She knows her mother wants the best for her and Nojiko.</p><p>It still doesn’t stop the delicious taste of mikan sauce fade with each day until Nami can’t look at the warm food on the table without feeling sick. But she continues to eat because Bellemere-san refuses to and fights to keep it down amidst the sickness and nausea until one day she can’t keep quiet at the sight of Bellemere-san’s bony hand and says things she didn’t mean to, didn’t believe and the nausea was back again, hitting her hard.</p><p>And then Arlong appeared and she is left alone in a cold room and a tray of food. She can’t stop shaking and there is bile in her throat and her mind is on repeat. Bellemere-san’s death played again and again and again before her eyes and when she looks at the tray she is reminded of mikans and cigarettes and she doesn’t feel hungry anymore.</p><p>
  <em>(The next day they force her to eat and she doesn’t know how she keeps it down. But at the first chance to go to toilet she empties her stomach, something burning her throat and hate filling her heart.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(It was a reflex to eat, she needed to survive but as the days went by Nami failed to notice how little she ate and the increasing number of times she couldn’t help but empty her stomach.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(She hates Arlong, hates him, hates him, hates him and she hates the food they give her to eat while her sister and village are struggling to survive.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(Maybe this was the starting point. Maybe, maybe, maybe.)</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Days, weeks, months, years go by and the times she feels nauseous increase and the sickness she felt while watching Bellemere-san give her food to her and Nojiko becomes a permanent companion. But she has money to get, so she ignores this and works to get better at pickpocketing, at combat, at lying and pretending.</p><p>She is a good actress, she thinks, and smiles at Nojiko over the table with warm food.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Stealing money became the only way to satiate the horrible hunger inside her but it never made the devouring emptiness disappear. Nothing did.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Skipping meals became more common but Nami never threw up anything Nojiko has cooked her. She doesn’t want to waste her sister’s hard work and the little she is able to make with her money. Nami always gives her berry but she knows Nojiko never uses them. So Nami eats the food with a smile and hates herself for hating the taste and for the want to throw up.</p><p>Nothing tastes good anymore. Nami tried, she tried to eat when she was away, she needed energy, needed the dizziness to disappear, needed to focus. But it all ended with her first purging and this was one secret she would never let her sister know. She knows it isn’t healthy, it is getting harder to concentrate and there is a faint buzzing in her head. She looks at food and sometimes she is fine but when she isn’t, she just learns to pay attention and be quick even with the heaviness of her limbs and the static in her head. It doesn’t help when she starts to like how light her body can be when she is not tired and how she looks.</p><p>She knows she should be terrified at this but it brings her a sense of calm she didn’t know she needed.</p><p>She is getting closer to her goal and saving some berries from meals, it is all good for her and she is happy. She is fine.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>She collapses on a kitchen’s chair, exhausted and with a broken arm, and she ignores the concerned glances Nojiko shoots her and counts. She is not even halfway there but she is getting better at stealing without being caught, at faking so she gets shelter for the night, at playing others and leaving them with nothing. This time she just wasn’t careful enough, it was okay, she will be more careful next time, she will be okay.</p><p>
  <em>(She ignored the way static and cotton were filling her ears, her far too small body and the emptiness in her stomach.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(Being small was good. It let her slip in unnoticed, it made her hander to catch, it let her get what she wanted when people saw the little girl in front of them.)</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>She meets Luffy and joins him temporary. He and Zoro are pirates but they are not so bad, Nami decides. They are stupid and funny and Nami feels happy. They don’t have a lot of food and Luffy is a black hole but this is fine. It works perfectly for her – the portions are small, so most of the time she is fine. But sometimes, as she is okay she is not and she has to be very careful not to let them notice. They were allies but if you give someone your weakness, they are going to hurt you.</p><p>She ignores her too-slim body and hides the poking ribs and her tattoo with shirts and jackets. Recently her head was always filled with static and cotton and sometimes she gets lost in it. It is comforting to disconnect from the world and pretend she is safe and sound with Bellemere-san and Nojiko like before.</p><p>She loves how she looks in the mirror, a twisted type of love, and in the back of her mind she knows Nojiko is really worried and long since realized she was not eating a lot and she knows that if Bellemere-san was alive, she would be very disappointed. She knows but a smile appears on her lips when she chooses today’s wear and nibs on an apple.</p><p>
  <em>(Something inside her twists at the reflection in the mirror, at the tired eyes and the deranged smile.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(She knows.)</em>
</p><p>
  <em>(She ignores it.)</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>She is finally free. She is free and the party around her is loud and Nami has never smiled wider. She is eating some chicken wings, fingers greasy and lighter than she has been in years.</p><p>
  <em>(The first week she enjoys Sanji’s cooking and not once does she feel nauseous. Sanji is a great cook and his meals are balanced and Nami thinks she might finally get better.)</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>It is a normal afternoon when she starts to feel sick again, after eating the fruits salad Sanji made for her, and she wants to cry. Sanji’s food is delicious like nothing has been in years and Nami was doing so well. She quickly finishes it and excuses herself to the toilet. She feels the sickening sweetness burning her tongue and the familiar hollowness in her stomach.</p><p>She was doing so well. She was doing so well, so why?</p><p>Swallowing tears in the bathroom’s floor, Nami felt shame. This was wrong, it has been for years, and she ignored it. She let it grow until it became normal and now she can’t stop.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“Nami-san?”</p><p>Sanji is behind her and she can hear the concern in his voice. She turns to him, eyes wide and fingers dirty. She wasn’t fast enough and now someone knows. Sanji knows. Sweet Sanji who always makes her light desserts and balanced diet, Sanji whose work she wastes. He looks at her and she can see him connecting the dots.</p><p>There were a few times she had skipped meals and recently Luffy has been looking at her with a blank face and she knew he was good at reading people. It left her feeling so ashamed at the possibility her sunshine of a captain could see this part of her, this dirty part of her. So, suddenly, caught by Sanji purging after eating his cooking, filled with shame, something inside her crumbles and she finally lets the truth fall from her lips.</p><p>“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Sanji.”</p><p>Broken sobs rock her body, tears dripping silently down her face and sticky sweetness and acid in her mouth. Her hands tighten around Sanji’s suit but he only smiles softly and holds her in his arms.</p><p>He has always been smart. She should have expected this to happen. She buries her head in his chest.</p><p>He smells like cigarettes and spices, a smell that reminds her of Bellemere-san, and she feels sick.</p><p>His hand is running through her hair, smile never disappearing and blue eyes shining with understanding and worry.</p><p>“It is okay, Nami-san. I am the cook, I should have noticed.” She lets out a bitter laugh and he sighs.</p><p>“I was like that too, you know? I should have seen the signs.”</p><p>Nami sucks in a breath and looks at him, at his fit body and the healthy color of his skin, at the kind eyes and smile and thinks <em>no</em>. He couldn’t have – not this kind man who refuses to waste food and let other people starve. He couldn’t, Nami refuses to believe this, <em>doesn’t want to believe it,</em> not when the man in front of her doesn’t deserve that, not when he is one of the little people in the world who cared.</p><p>
  <em>(Did he, too, ignore it like her and let it grow until it consumed every thought he has?)</em>
</p><p>The smile is back and Nami feels another kind of hurt even though understanding is something she should be grateful for, she can’t and she is an awful friend. For wasting Sanji’s hard work, for looking him and the others in the faces and lying, for ignoring Luffy’s knowing eyes, for making them worry, for being so ungrateful to the gentle man holding her in his hands with no judgment in his eyes.</p><p>“After opening the Baratie there were days when everything I ate tasted like ash and was like lead in my stomach. And that’s perfectly okay, Nami-san. It’s not something you need to hide.”</p><p>She knows. She knows. These people know her past, her pain, her greatest fears and they beat them. Even when she betrayed them, they came and didn’t let go of her. They are friends, family, nakama and they won’t ever judge her. She knows. And this is exactly why she wanted to hide it when it appeared again, pretend she is okay just like before. Because the voice in her head never disappeared, doubt and worry and fear mixing with self-hate and the chance, however slim, they decide she is weak and disgusting and shameful? Nami knows this would destroy her. And this is something she doesn’t want to give up, not when she is finally free, not now, not ever.</p><p>
  <em>(Strawhat on her head and reassurance on his lips. She is not alone.)</em>
</p><p>She knows they will never leave her. And sometimes she fears this more than anything.</p><p>“Just tell me when you feel nauseous. You don’t have to force yourself to eat.”</p><p>But Sanji <em>gets</em> it and Nami hates it because her friend didn’t deserve that. He smells like cigarettes and spices and Nami is at home.</p><p>“A-at first it was okay. I was okay and your cooking was delicious. I don’t know what triggered it. I’m so sorry Sanji.”</p><p>The hand around her pulls her closer and Nami loves this warmth.</p><p>“If you would allow me Nami-san, I will help you. It may never truly go away but I can help you minimize it.”</p><p>Nami thinks back to the shame, the emptiness, the wrongness, the fear. Sanji is not mad at her and wants to help. And Nami wants it to end. She wants to get better, wants that help.</p><p>“Yeah. Yeah, I would love to.”</p><p>The fragile smile she gives him is a start and his bright grin makes her forget the emptiness in her and the sticky sweetness in her mouth. She can try. She will try. For him, for them, for herself. And she will try <em>with</em> him.</p><p>She is not alone.</p>
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